


Postmortem

by Sonetka



Category: Lord Peter Wimsey - Dorothy L. Sayers
Genre: Gen, strong poison
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-31
Updated: 2017-12-31
Packaged: 2019-02-24 12:36:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 3,587
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13213896
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sonetka/pseuds/Sonetka
Summary: We know what happened to the leads inStrong Poison, but where did the secondaries end up? A look into what they were up to, not long after the end.





	1. The Rev. Arthur Boyes

Ryland Vaughan had only been able to secure a half-day's leave from the bank, so while the Reverend Arthur Boyes would have preferred to have his breakfast in peaceful solitude, he could hardly fail to invite that young man to join him when he appeared on the parsonage doorstep at eight o'clock sharp, eager to gather as much information as possible about Philip's childhood before the departure of the eleven o'clock train to London. Vaughan had brought a large, battered notebook with him, and appeared to have but little appetite – he contented himself with a cup of strong tea, rubbing his head periodically as if it pained him, and talking all the while. Mr Boyes, who was never quite awake until after he had breakfasted, had to beg Vaughan to desist for a few moments. “I shall be quite at your service after breakfast, but I find it very difficult to think until then.”

Vaughan made a few polite noises and then retreated into the section of the morning paper which Mr Boyes had already finished. A few moments later, a loud snort almost caused a startled Boyes to drop his toast.

“Well-known detective authoress,” said Vaughan bitterly. “Did you see this item here? Miss Harriet Vane, the well-known detective authoress, has recently returned from an extended trip abroad, where she – here, see for yourself.”

He thrust the paper in Boyes's face, though in fact there was no necessity for doing so. Mr Boyes had already seen the item when he had read the paper half an hour earlier. “What of it, Mr Vaughan?” he inquired with a yawn. 

“Traveling abroad,” said Vaughan. “As if she hadn't a care in the world. She wouldn't bother to talk to me about Phil for my book, even if I asked her. She has quite enough to occupy her, going to literary cocktail parties and keeping His Detective Lordship on a string.”

“He seemed a very sympathetic young man, when I spoke to him,” said Boyes absently, starting in on his egg.

“It's all play-acting,” said Vaughan. “He made out that he sympathized with me as well, but he was only interested in getting the girl out of the dock. And she must have known something about it, she –”

Boyes looked up sharply. “Mr Vaughan, while I am pleased that you wish to write my son's biography, you must understand that I have no intention of discussing the trials with you. It is an extremely distressing subject. I am grateful that Mrs Boyes did not live long enough to see her family torn apart in such a fashion, but I can assure you that even for me, it was painful enough. Be good enough not to speak of Miss Vane, or of – of Norman Urquhart, or anyone else in that connection.”

Vaughan blinked, and suddenly looked very tired. “My apologies, Mr Boyes. My tongue runs away with me sometimes ...” the ensuing pause threatened to become uncomfortable. “Do you mind if I take that last piece of toast?”

“Not at all.”

They were quiet for a few more minutes until the plates had been cleared, then, at Mr Boyes' suggestion, decamped into the sitting-room, where Mr Boyes had gathered together a number of Philip's school exercise books and some early literary attempts. He had tried to look at a few of the early poems and had found his heart contracting unpleasantly – it almost felt as if the young Philip might walk in at any moment and tell him that the last few years had been merely an unhappy dream. 

Mr Vaughan, apparently chastened, made no effort to discuss Philip's death and the aftermath any further, and confined himself to taking industrious notes on Philip's childhood, the clever sayings he had produced, his early dislike of school, and the prizes he had nonetheless managed to win, both for his original essays and for his Greek and Latin translations. “I had hoped that he would study philology at university,” Boyes found himself saying, “He had a real talent for languages, had he cared to develop it. But he placed a few poems in a literary magazine called, I think, _Volcano_ or some such name, and after that he cared for nothing but writing. He said he would far rather make poor things of his own than merely copy the great words of dead men.”

“That was very like Philip,” said Vaughan, taking one of the schoolbooks into his hand as if it were a particularly precious jewel. “He wanted to be on the front lines, not hanging back in the old forms. If he had only … but at least we still have his work.”

It was a very long hour and a half, but at least Vaughan packed up his notebook, along with Philip's old books, and made his departure for the railway station.

Mr Boyes, who had intended to sort through a mass of overdue paperwork before lunch, found that he was so unsettled that he could not concentrate. Finally, he pushed the papers aside and went for a walk; it was a hot, beautiful summer morning and the garden behind the house, although he could not maintain it as well as its creators would have wished, was nonetheless a pleasant enough place to recoup one's thoughts. Philip had spent a great deal of time here as a child; many of those early poems had been composed sitting on the creaky bench by the begonia patch, although he had naturally slammed his book closed whenever he noticed his father approaching. The churchyard was not far distant, where Philip's mother lay, alongside his infant sister (although she would have been Philip's elder, had she lived). And now Philip was there as well.

As for Norman Urquhart, he lay, as his sentence had been, in Pentonville where he was last confined. That death had been, in some ways, even more dreadful than Philip's. Mr Boyes had attempted to visit his nephew by marriage several times before the end, to offer his prayers and, as far he was able, forgiveness, but each time he had been refused. Even now he could not be sure whether he could have fully, sincerely, forgiven the man had he been confronted with him in the flesh. The thought of Philip's dying as a result of unbridled emotion had been a horrible one, but that his death should have come as a long-desired result of years of careful planning, from a series of cold-blooded financial calculations – that had been very hard. _They have erred from the faith, and pierced themselves through with many sorrows._ But it was not just Philip and himself whom Urquhart had pierced. Almost, for a moment, Boyes had wished Miss Vane guilty after all, but the facts had spoken for themselves. To have persisted in believing her guilty would have been to do her almost as grave an injustice as Philip's cousin had done to him.

And as time had passed, he had found to his own surprise that it rather pleased him to see favourable mention of her in the papers. There had been that shocking occasion when the poor girl had stumbled upon a corpse on a beach somewhere to the south, but that reflected no discredit on her, and indeed the whole business seemed to have been satisfactorily if not happily resolved. Otherwise, she seemed to have stayed on a straightforward and industrious path, no matter what Vaughan might insinuate to the contrary. He could not, in fact, entirely understand Vaughan's animus against her, unless it were perhaps simple literary jealousy – though why that should be so, when Vaughan had never said a word indicating interest in detective novels, was a mystery to him. Poor Vaughan; a lonely soul, obviously, and rather trying as so many lonely souls were wont to be. Mr Boyes had serious doubts that Vaughan's biography of Philip would ever see print, or even that he would finish writing it. He seemed to be treating the biography merely as a reason to talk of Philip, not as an end in itself. Well, there was little harm in that. All the same, however, it was good to see that the distant Miss Vane had chosen to remove herself and keep on moving forward. As long as she was doing well, there had been at least one good thing saved from the tragedy of Philip's murder. And Philip, who had been a kindly boy at heart, would surely have been glad to see her well and happy.


	2. Mr Pond

Mr Pond was thinking about going home. The late March weather was surprisingly pleasant, and he was considering buying some daffodils as a little surprise for Mrs Pond. The blue skies and warm winds outside made it difficult to concentrate on the masses of paper telling mutely of Mr Urquhart’s financial double-dealings. Urquhart himself was now approaching trial, amidst noisy speculation in the more vulgar papers about whether he would be the second solicitor to hang for murder, and Miss Murchison and the few other staff were all long gone. Only Mr Pond was was left, still drawing his weekly pay at the instructions of Mr. Urquhart’s far-off Australian relatives, attempting to close or transfer his clients’ accounts and shut down the office properly. However, a job that he had anticipated would take no more than a few weeks had now lasted a mortifying two months and more, as it became apparent that few of them had had their accounts un-tampered with and that tracing the sources of the irregularities required more patient financial sleuthing than he had known he was capable of. His initial disbelief at the news of Urquhart’s arrest for murder had receded in face of the remorseless evidence of his thievery. A man capable of cold-blooded theft of this sort was, in Mr Pond's opinion, equally capable of cold-blooded murder. 

The crash of a bucket outside and the clattering of mops and brooms announced the arrival of Mrs Hodges. 

“Beg pardon, sir! I didn’t know you was still in here.”

“Yes, Mrs Hodges, I have a good deal here still to do — please carry on.”

She began carrying on, running a broom almost underneath his feet and swiping the feather duster on shelves inches from his head. He gritted his teeth and said nothing — the less he objected, the sooner she would be gone. He bent his head to the line of figures in front of him, but they seemed to swim in front of his eyes.

“I didn’t think what it took so long to close up an office,” Mrs. Hodges remarked as a deed-box came perilously close to crashing to the floor. “When Mr Smith and Mr Brierly shut down, it didn’t take them more’n a week or two. But there! It’s one thing when a man’s done things on the up and up, and another when he’s been doing the dirty on someone. I told Jim last January, after I seen Miss Murchison, I told him, Mr Urquhart’s going to have the law after him soon enough, I said, and sure enough —“

Mr Pond turned his head sharply. “What? What did Miss Murchison — you knew he would be arrested?”

“Not for murder or nothing, sir, nothing like that. But when I seen Miss Murchison creeping around the deed-boxes and pretending as she lost a pattern so she could look behind that sliding panel in Mr Urquhart’s office, I says to myself, Oho! He’s been robbing some people as trusted him with their money and she’s a lady ‘tec as is going to find him out. Jim always says as you can never trust them solicitors, they’re just thieves as has some education.”

“You knew about the panel?” Even these fascinating revelations about Miss Murchison, whom Mr. Pond had previously regarded as a thoroughly second-rate specimen of both a secretary and a female, could not take away his surprise at this. His own first inkling of the panel had come only when two courteous but inflexible policemen had made their way into the office with a warrant. He had watched in enthralled horror as they opened the panel, picked the lock behind it, and brought forth the horrifying contents. 

“I thought as everyone knew about them — all the inner offices have them, as to keep thieves from finding things. Not that a lot of documents goes into them, as a rule — Mr Partridge keeps his best brandy there and Mr Alderman keeps the little things from his lady friends as he doesn’t want his wife to know about. But I never could tell what Mr Urquhart kept there on account of that lock. Brrr! I’m glad I didn’t, either, what if I’d touched that powder accidental?”

Mr. Pond was aghast. “Did it never occur to you to warn Mr Urquhart that Miss Murchison was going through his papers? Of course, it’s as well that she did, but as a matter of principle—“

Mrs Hodges flicked the feather duster uncomfortably close to his nose. “Not him! He was as tight as the bark to a tree — no tips, nothing for Christmas even. I didn't see no call to look out for him. And Miss Murchison, she was that clever, I didn’t want to keep her finding out what he was up to. Though she could have saved herself a lot of trouble if she’d have asked me if there was any hiding places in these offices, I’d have told her that.”

Mr Pond rose and reached for his hat. “I'll miss my train. Do you have the key? Very good. Good night, Mrs Hodges."

He walked out onto Chancery Row, barely seeing what was ahead of him. Miss Murchison a detective, Mrs Hodges — both of them had known that something very deep and dark was happening, whereas he, the senior clerk …

He was halfway home before he realized that he had forgotten Mrs Pond’s daffodils.


	3. Miss Booth

“Have another bun, Aunt Lucy,” said George. “You look famished. Do you know, I hardly recognized you when you arrived the other day — ever since I was small I’ve barely seen you without the veil.”

Miss Booth took the bun and poured another cup of tea. She was famished, ravenous even — which was odd, considering how little real energy her last job had needed until the end. Mrs Wrayburn’s death at the end of May had followed her great-nephew’s execution by only one week, and that week had been an agonizing one. After the corpse was laid out, Miss Booth had slipped into the room and whispered to her, “Thank you for leading us to the truth, dear Mrs Wrayburn.” The next day she had been paid her final wages and left. Only after arriving at her brother’s house for a visit had she realized how very tired she was.

“I read all about it,” George was saying. “Who would think that you would find yourself in the middle of a sensation up in Windle?”

“Not in the middle of one, precisely,” said Miss Booth, taking another bun. “The nephew lived in London, though I did see him every few months, when he came to visit.”

“Talking to a murderer! I hope he didn’t offer you any drinks -- or omelettes,” said George, and laughed. Tom and Beatrice looked at him disapprovingly. “It’s hardly a joking matter,” said Tom. “Your aunt was fortunate.” 

“All the same,” said Beatrice, “It did seem such a strange case. I find it very hard to believe that they would have arrested that girl and brought her to trial if she really weren’t involved. The police are very careful, you know, and she sounds such a strange girl. I wonder if she and that nephew may have done the murder together.”

“But I thought,” said Miss Booth, “That they had never met each other — that’s what it said in the papers.”

“Of course,” said Beatrice, “But that’s what they would say, isn’t it, if they’re trying to protect her. And you can’t tell me that when a My Lord takes an interest, the police and the papers won’t listen to him. No, mark my words, she was involved in some way.”

“That’s as may be, Mother,” said George, who was less inclined to be severe upon women of relaxed reputation (his years in France had been educational in more ways than one). “But that Urquhart was involved, there was no doubt of it — they tested his hair and everything. So even if the girl helped him, they haven’t hanged an innocent man.”

“The girl didn’t help him in the slightest!” Miss Booth burst out. Three shocked pairs of eyes looked at her, obviously wondering at the emotion she was showing. “I mean,” she said, “That he surely would have mentioned it.”

“Who would have mentioned it?” said George.

“Philip Boyes, or even Mrs Wrayburn. I have a most wonderful medium friend who helped me speak to Mrs Wrayburn’s spirit even while she was alive, and she knew that there was something strange about that will, and that Mr. Urquhart was involved -- she was so concerned that we should find it and send it to him. And this was all long before he was arrested or there was any suspicion at all, so as you can see, it must have been true.”

The other three shot quick glances at each other of a type which Miss Booth knew very well; dear Lucy, talking nonsense again. But this time she knew that she was in the right — she had been at that seance, and had seen for herself Mrs Wrayburn’s knowledge of Norman and the will. Besides — “After he was arrested, we communicated with the spirit of Philip Boyes as well. My friend wasn’t sure he’d come, he sounded like such an angry spirit, but he did come once.”

“Really,” said George, grinning. “What did he have to say for himself? I read _Nineveh_ a few months ago; if he talked like the people in the book he probably singed your hair.”

“He was very tiresome,” Miss Booth admitted. “He only wanted to know about his sales. But when I asked him if the girl had poisoned him he said `Don’t talk nonsense — as if she could.’ “

“That’s not exactly a denial,” said George. “Perhaps he didn’t know who did it.”

“I feel very sure that he knew her better than we could.”

“I’ll say he did,” said George.

“And I refuse to believe that the spirits would have left us ignorant if she really were involved.”

“Be that as it may,” said Beatrice. “There’s something shady about her. Living with men and buying all those poisons, and now she’s got a Duke’s son on a string if the papers know anything about it. You keep your spirits, I believe the papers.”

There was a moment or two of silence, finally broken by George’s observation that the weather looked like turning to rain and they had better get indoors. “How long will you be staying with Mum and Dad, Aunt Lucy?” he asked as they went inside.

“Not very long, I think,” said Miss Booth. She found that her energy had been restored, and tomorrow she would visit the agency to see about finding another job. Perhaps, while in town, she would buy a Harriet Vane novel, as a gift for her sister-in-law.


	4. Ryland Vaughan

"I always knew there was something I didn't like about him," said Ryland Vaughan, as he sat at the counter with his second Guinness close to hand. "He kept creeping around Phil, having him to dinner, asking him to live in his house – the gentleman protested too much. And one could never tell what he was thinking. When I was in the witness-box, I looked at him all throughout – I felt I owed it to Phil, you know – and he never turned a hair."

"Really?" breathed young Mr Conley from Insurance and Research. "It must have been a frightful experience. Even reading about it in the papers was enough to make my hair stand on end. Why, he must have been planning it all for years – and poor old Boyes never suspecting a thing, nor anyone else. Miss! I'd like another, please. Have you any matches, Vaughan?"

"Here, just a tic." He presented the matches with the benevolent air of one who has infinite riches to bestow.

After a few puffs on his cigarette, Conley leaned in a little closer and said quietly, "It must have been a tricky sort of experience for her, mustn't it? Testifying against him, when a few months ago it was the reverse."

"What, for Miss Vane? I imagine it must have been."

"Didn't she say anything about it?"

"Certainly not to me. Miss Vane and I are not acquainted."

"That's a pity," said Conley, his smile a shade less animated. "I should have thought you had at least a few things in common."

"We both write, certainly – my new editions of Phil's books should be out in July. I'd be happy to send some copies round to you."

"Oh certainly, certainly." The cigarette was stubbed out and Conley picked up his briefcase. "But I say – would you happen to know the best address for writing to Miss Vane? You see, I write a bit myself, trying my hand at the Hawkshaw sort of thing –" he snapped the briefcase open, revealing a depressingly large sheaf of smudged typescript – "And if someone could persuade her to take a look at it, I'd be very grateful."


End file.
